Bristol Motor Speedway
Sprint veteran West gets rolling in Late Models
By James Baker
Ontario Dirt Late Models
Sprint veteran Adam West is getting started in Late Models. (apexonephotos.com)
Over the years in the diverse worlds of sprint car and Dirt Late Model racing, there has never been much common ground between the two divisions.
Sprint car enthusiasts say that they wouldn't walk across the street to watch the taxis run. And late model aficionados are no different. At many Southern ovals, when the sprint cars roll onto the track for an occasional show, the fans race to the hot dog stand.
Canadian driver Adam West, however, is doing his part to break down those barriers. West is a 30-year-old sprint car veteran from Ridgetown, Ontario, who has driven the open-wheeled sprint cars for eight years and in 2005 was the Southern Ontario Sprints champion.
This season, West has gotten behind the wheel of a Dirt Late Model. In his first Late Model effort in June's World of Outlaws Late Model Series event at Ohsweken (Ontario) Speedway, he failed to make the feature. But his next time out was much different.
In early August, West traveled to Humberstone Speedway in Port Colborne, Ontario, to race in the Ontario Dirt Late Models Civic Holiday Challenge and finished sixth among a solid field. His Late Model outing came a night after a fourth-place finish in a Southern Ontario Sprints event at South Buxton Raceway.
Fear not, sprint car fans. West has no plans to give-up the fire-breathing winged warriors and plans to compete in both sprint and Late Model events the rest of 2008. So far, West is adapting to his two-division role.
"I'm still surprised at how well things went in the Late Model, but I just drove the track the same way I drive it in the sprint car and everything worked out," said West, a mechanical engineer who is well aware of the differences between the two race cars. "It's still a big adjustment for me because I'm trying to learn and understand the feel of the Late Model. The car has a good basic chassis setup in it, so I need to bring my abilities up to get the most out of the car, especially early in the night when the track has a lot of grip. That has been the time when I struggled the most, trying to get the car to turn when the track is heavy and all the other cars are lifting the left-front wheel. When the track goes slick, I just try to keep the car straight and use the power to keep the car driving forward instead of sliding sideways, just like in a sprint car."
He also realizes that the weight difference — 1,500 pounds for a sprint car vs. 2,200 pounds for a Late Model — and the aerodynamics that the wing brings to a sprint car, have a great impact on how both cars handle on the track.
"The sprint car relies a lot on aerodynamics for speed, which is something that you can see or feel when you are setting up the car. ... You just need to get out on the track and drive it hard and keep the car straight and the downforce will hold the car on the track," West said. "The Late Model is all about mechanical grip and suspension travel to get its traction, so I need to learn how to properly load the suspension at the right time to get the car to turn and get forward bite coming off the corner. As far as driving, the simple difference is a sprint car needs a lot of throttle and very little steering input. The Late Model needs throttle finesse and lots of steering."
Like many youngsters, West began his racing career in go-karts in 1992 at the age 14. His won 62 races his first year along with two track championships, won 46 of 51 races the next year the moved up to run successfully in micro sprints through 1998. West and his father and crew chief Jerry West moved up to the larger hurricane midgets in 1999 and then into sprint cars in 2001.
After running with the Southern Ontario Sprints a few years, West was tabbed at 25 years old in 2003 for the Knoxville International Driver Development Program, offering West to run a complete season at historic Knoxville (Iowa) Raceway. West was selected from a large group of international candidates from Canada, Australia and New Zealand. But the one-year deal to race at Knoxville got even better when he got to pilot a sprint car for National Sprint Car Hall Of Fame car owner and mechanic Bob Trostle, learning to race against the best drivers in the world.
"My on-track success that year wasn't the best, but the experience I had, the things that I learned racing against the best in the business, week after week, will always stick with me," West said.
West returned to Canada, showing that the experience he gained in Knoxville was soon evident by winning features at Brighton and Ohsweken speedways in 2005, and he went on to win the Southern Ontario Sprints championship.
Despite his new-found aspirations in Late Models, West has no plans to abandon sprint cars. He plans to run the remainder of the 2008 Southern Ontario Sprints schedule.
"Right now, I don't see myself leaving sprint cars completely in the near future future, because there are still a lot of things that I would like to accomplish before moving on," West said. "I want to have a top-10 finish in the Canadian Sprint Car Nationals some time because that is a really important race to us, and I also want to get back to Knoxville to run the 360 Nationals again some time to see where we stack up against the best in the business."
As for Late Models, West plans to run both remaining Ontario Dirt Late Model events Aug. 29 at Ohsweken and Sept. 20 at Brighton. Like his sprint team, the Late Model race team is also a family deal. Fiancee Andrea's parents, Charles and Debbie Brush, own and maintain the car with George McFadden and McKay also helping out.
"I'm enjoying it because I always like a new challenge, and I love any kind of racing," he said. "But I definitely still feel like a rookie because I'm trying to understand what the car is doing, how I need to react to it, and communicate that to the crew to make the car suit my driving style.
His Late Model goals remain simple. "It's still pretty early to set my goals in the late model, so my main concern right now is to finish all the races and get as many laps as I can," West said. "And eventually I want to win a feature, especially for Debbie and Charles, because they have put so much effort into racing, and I want them to be able to experience winning a feature in the race series (Ontario Dirt Late Models) that they have created."
